The Isle of Palms City Council is getting closer to providing some help for property owners whose homes are being threatened by severe erosion at the southwest end of the island.
At their Feb. 13 workshop, Council members directed city staff to prepare two emergency ordinances that will be considered at a Feb. 20 meeting – one that would permit homeowners to build seawalls in specific places to protect their properties and another that would at least temporarily lift the city’s restrictions on hard erosion control structures.
One of the options Council members are to consider Feb. 20 will allow property owners to install seawalls or revetments up to 35 feet from the maximum building line, a boundary established by the city in 1988 to keep homes a certain distance from the ocean. Residents with existing pools further than 35 feet from the line would be permitted to build a seawall or revetment up to 8 feet past the pool.
The other proposed emergency ordinance would simply temporarily do away with the current regulation that prohibits erosion control structures within 250 feet landward of the tide’s mean high-water mark.
Either ordinance, which would require the approval of at least two-thirds of Council members present at the Feb. 20 meeting, would have no effect in areas of the beach controlled by the Ocean & Resource Management division of the state Department of Health and Environmental Control. The ordinances apply only to properties between 100 and 914 Ocean Blvd. All work would be paid for by homeowners.
The decision to look at the two options emerged after a lengthy discussion concerning OCRM’s ever-changing jurisdiction over various areas of the beach, striking a balance between protecting homes and accounting for in-ground pools and determining how seawalls should be positioned to provide the most reliable help for the largest number of homes.
At the workshop, Council Member Blair Hahn said the city should be concerned about saving homes but not necessarily pools.
“What everybody is talking about isn’t ‘I want to save my pool.’ They’re saying ‘I want to save my house, and I want to save the foundation of my house,’” Hahn pointed out. “The compromise is to do it 20 feet from the max build line and be done with it.”
Much of the discussion concerned finding a way to protect pools and still make it possible for seawalls to be built in a reasonably straight line, which most of the Council agreed would provide the best possible protection against erosion and flooding.
“The problem is that the setback line touches at least three pools,” Council Member Katie Miars noted. “A number of these pools are already too far out. Engineers say a lot of different things about seawalls, but one thing that is consistent is that they need to be consistent.”
“One of the main reasons for us as a city being involved is to make it as effective as possible,” she added. “We can all agree that a continuous seawall would be most effective. If you leave this strictly up to the property owners, there’s no way you’re going to have a straight wall. We have to come up with some line that’s going to be the most possible straight, continuous line.”
Council Member John Bogosian pointed out that even if homeowners are permitted to build seawalls or revetments, the city cannot force them to do so.
“One homeowner may do it and the next five not do it. That’s why the city needs to get out of it – allow the homeowners to do what they want and work with OCRM. Wherever OCRM says they can build it, they can build it. The city needs to get out of the way,” he said.
Hahn added, however, that “We have to have a uniform line. That’s better than having a hodgepodge. If we just leave it with OCRM, it’s going to be a hodgepodge.”
An emergency ordinance can be in effect for 60 days and can be renewed after that. Under either version, seawalls or revetments must be approved by the city, designed by a registered, qualified engineer and be covered by beach-compatible sand that is not taken from the beach; adjacent property owners must be notified in writing; and construction must be coordinated with OCRM. In addition, “seawalls and revetments shall be designed so as to be continuous with any existing or planned revetments installed on adjacent properties, to the extent possible.”